Moon-madness, and other fantasies — Story, Setting & Ideas

Recurring Visual Anchors

Nearly every story in Moon-Madness and Other Fantasies is organized around a single, sharply described visual element. In “Our Lady of Red Lips,” the narrator dwells on the woman’s “creamy white” complexion, “inky black” hair, “dark green” eyes, and above all her “bright red” lips—repeating the color scheme until it becomes almost hypnotic. “Paula Loved Pearls” similarly fixates on the titular gems, while “The Dance of the Cobra” centers on the movement of a snake. These anchors are not merely decorative; they drive the plot. The man in the first story enters the shop because of the lips; Paula’s love of pearls determines her fate. Gouraud often returns to the same descriptive phrases, as if the object itself is casting a spell over the narrative.

Dialogue as a Mechanism of Power

Gouraud’s stories advance almost entirely through dialogue, and that dialogue is structured as a series of short, repetitive exchanges that escalate into confrontations. In “Kara the Faithful,” the Ranee and Kara speak in clipped lines: “I love you!” / “I—must—go!” / “Why?” / “I am a servant.” The repetition of “my lady” and “I serve—him” turns the conversation into a ritual of refusal. The same pattern appears in “Our Lady of Red Lips,” where the art dealer and the customer trade questions about the dead painter. Each reply is a single sentence, often a near-echo of the previous line. This technique creates a rhythm of tension and release, with power shifting between speakers as one character insists and the other resists.

Movement Between Exotic Settings

The stories leap from Paris to India to unspecified “exotic” locales with little transition. “Our Lady of Red Lips” begins with a man on a Paris street; “Kara the Faithful” unfolds in a Rajah’s palace; “Betty and Buddha” suggests an Eastern temple. Gouraud does not describe these settings in detail—a few words (“the place was Paris,” “the Ranee’s chamber”) suffice. The effect is that each story feels like a stage set, a backdrop for the central confrontation. The movement is abrupt: a character is in one place, then another, with no travel or explanation. This structural choice emphasizes the dreamlike, almost theatrical quality of the fantasies, where geography is less important than the charged encounter between two people.

The Unreliable or Incomplete Frame

Several stories rely on a frame that is only partially revealed. In “Our Lady of Red Lips,” the art dealer tells a tale of a painter who died “under peculiar circumstances,” and the customer presses for details—but the excerpt breaks off before the full story is told. Similarly, “Kara the Faithful” ends with the Ranee threatening Kara with a dungeon, but the resolution is cut short. These incomplete frames are not accidents of the excerpt; the table of contents lists eight stories, and the surviving text suggests that Gouraud often withholds the final outcome, leaving the reader to imagine the consequences. This structural ambiguity is a deliberate feature: the fantasies are meant to linger, unresolved, like the painted lips that continue to smile after the viewer has walked away.

Because the excerpts are incomplete, readers should approach each story as a fragment—a single scene or a handful of scenes that build to a moment of crisis rather than a full resolution. Gouraud’s strength lies in the intensity of that moment: the refusal, the kiss, the threat, the obsession. Pay attention to what is repeated and what is left unsaid; the gaps in the dialogue and the abrupt shifts in setting are part of the design. These are fantasies of desire and power, told in a style that is as stark and vivid as the red lips that begin the collection.

There’s something about the way Gouraud lingers over a single object—a pearl, a portrait—until it feels weighted with years. Reading it, I often think of quieter hours spent with A Transient Guest, and Other Episodes — A Reader’s Guide, which holds that same patient, almost melancholy stillness. It’s a strange comfort, finding a familiar ache in old pages.